


I'll be Buried Here with You

by Skull_Bearer



Category: Venom (Movie 2018)
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Cancer, Codependency, Depression, Drowning, Eddie being a self-destructive idiot, Eddie is surrounded by good people who want to help him, Grief/Mourning, Loss, M/M, Reunion Fic, Sick Eddie Brock, Suicidal Thoughts, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-03
Updated: 2019-01-03
Packaged: 2019-09-17 10:30:39
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,497
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16972902
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Skull_Bearer/pseuds/Skull_Bearer
Summary: It's easy to die. Easy to close your eyes and sleep forever. It's so much harder to be the one left behind.So, so much harder than Eddie could have imagined.





	I'll be Buried Here with You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DarkSilverWings](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarkSilverWings/gifts).



> Thank you to Dogmatix and QueenLaraJean on Tumblr for the beta work. You guys were great!
> 
> Prompt from DarkSilverWings was: Really heavy angst, but please no character death 
> 
> Hope this satisfies your angst cravings!
> 
> Title is from Skulls by Bastille.

 

**_Goodbye, Eddie._ **

Eddie breaks the surface of the water and starts coughing. The salt burns his nose, his throat; he’s choking and he can’t _breathe_. He flails and there’s nothing—just the soft blur of the water, sucking him down. He tries to find—something, anything—and his hands close on nothing.

The water must be freezing, but against the slow, draining cold inside him, it feels warm. “No—”  Eddie tries to cry out, but the currents drag him down. He kicks, sucks in air, kicks desperately against the clinging weight of his clothes, and drags his body towards land.

Shards of burning shrapnel stud the edge of the water. Eddie coughs, and coughs again, shivering as he drags himself up through the sand. He gets his legs under him and staggers to his feet. The world wavers and dances as he tries to catch his breath, the blood rushing to his head.

The treeline is burning. The water is burning. The fuel is everywhere and it’s all on fire. “Venom—” Eddie gasps, but it’s no more than a whisper, his throat ragged from seawater. The water shimmers black everywhere, the fire spreading quickly. “No!”

His hands cuts through the water, trying to grab the burning slick. There’s nothing to hold. Just water. It might be fuel, it _must_ be fuel. Please. Please no.

“Venom!” His voice cuts shriller, high and desperate.

Nothing. Just the flames, washing over the waves. Eddie lurches down the beach. A huge knot of burning metal and plastic hulks just a few feet away and there’s something dark inside, viscous and slick and _please, please—_

Eddie doesn’t care about the flames, the razor edges of shattered steel. He digs his hands in tries to grab something solid in the wreckage. His hands bury into oil-slick sand and he pulls out great handfuls of the stuff, looking down in despair.

“Venom.” Nothing. It might be oil. It might have been more, once. No more.

“No.” Eddie spins around, his hands are raw and blistered from the heat, but he cannot feel them. “No. Please. Where are you?”

No answer but the crackle and roar of the flames. Eddie’s eyes blur, but this time, the salt isn’t seawater. The fire dances in his eyes, doubling and tripling until the whole world is burning. No. _No._

There. Just down the beach. Something else burning. He might not be there. It’s blazing so furiously Eddie desperately hopes he isn’t, but he might be. He might be there, helpless and hostless, waiting to die—

“I’m coming,” he chokes, and forces his aching, bloody body into a run.

He doesn’t know how long he’s there. The sky is starting to turn grey as he digs through the wreckage. His clothes reek of smoke, his hands are red and swollen with burns. His eyes running with tears. _Please. Please._

“Eddie!”

Eddie’s head snaps up, eyes wide but—it’s Annie. She’s stumbling, clothes torn from running through the trees. Her eyes go wide where she sees him. “What are you doing?!”

“He’s gone—” Eddie starts and stops. He can’t breathe. _Gone_. “I can’t—I’ve got to find him—”

Annie looks around. The sun’s not quite up yet, and the last embers of the fires are flickering in the slowly rising mist. “Eddie.” there’s something heavy and pitying there and he can’t hear it, he _can’t_ —

“No!” Eddie snarls, turns to find something else to search. Something more of the ruined rocket scattered everywhere, in which something might still be hiding, frightened and wounded and dying in the poisonous atmosphere—

“Stop it!” Annie grabs him. Eddie cries out as her stiff, boney fingers close around his raw, bloated ones. “Eddie, you can’t save him. You’re hurt. We’re going to hospital.”

“No—” he tries to pull back, but she’s too strong, his body doesn’t want to respond. The pain is closing in on him and he chokes, stumbling.

Annie pulls him down until they’re both on the sand. “I’m sorry.” She whispers. “I’m so sorry Eddie, but he’s gone. He’s gone.”

“No!” Eddie tries to pull away, and she lets him, and he nearly collapses. “He saved me. The fire—”

“I saw.” Annie puts her hand on his shoulder. Eddie looks at it blankly, his clothes are so torn and burnt they’re barely clothes at all. “He was so brave. You both were.”

Eddie can’t breathe. He can’t see, tears blinding him. The world swims and fades and he buries his face in his hands. Annie watches helplessly for a moment as he sobs, then pulls him into her arms. Eddie curls into a ball, closes his eyes and tries, very hard, not to exist.

 

* * *

 

 

Dan comes in their car. Annie has gotten him moving and Eddie collapses, huddled in on himself by the side of the road as she waves wildly to flag him down. The police are here now, a helicopter sweeping overhead and Eddie looks up desperately. Maybe they could see, maybe they would notice something he missed, crawling on the ground-

Annie’s hand tightens on his shoulder, warning him away from trying to get up. The car pulls up and _no_. He can’t go. He has to stay. Even if—if he’s too late, if all he can find is—what’s left, he can bury him. Eddie doesn’t know what Venom’s people do after death, if they’re even sentimental enough to have any ceremonies, but _God_ , Venom deserves it. He saved the world. He saved _Eddie_.

**_Goodbye, Eddie_.**

He died.

He’s crying again, can’t even see Dan as he and Annie help him into the car. “He needs the hospital.” Annie squeezes his shoulder, but Eddie doesn’t respond, just curling up helplessly in the backseat.

The car starts, and Eddie cries out as something sharp and burning imbeds itself in his chest. Like a hook, snagged around his heart, dragging back as the car moves away. Eddie tries to cry out, but he’s so exhausted all that comes is a cracked sob. _No, stop_ —

But they don’t stop. The car picks up speed, and the bay slides away until there’s nothing left but a last lingering column of black smoke in the distance, like a distant wave goodbye.

The world comes in stops and starts. They pull up at the hospital and Dan helps him out. A confused blur of waiting rooms; the sharp sting of gel on his burns, gauze being wrapped around his arm. Then Dan comes to get him and—

The MRI.

“We’ve got to be sure.” Dan pats his shoulder. “And I want to check the damage.”

Damage. Right. Venom said he was fixing him. Hopefully he’d managed to finish the job. Hopefully. Part of Eddie doesn’t care one way or the other because what’s left? What the hell has he got now?

Nothing.

The MRI doesn’t even make him shake. Eddie digs down desperately, trying to find something, _anything_ left.

Nothing.

He closes his eyes. He doesn’t cry. There aren’t any tears left. Dan and Annie are watching him nervously as he comes out, and he looks away. He can’t meet their eyes, he can’t see the pity and relief. He wants to cry. He wants to scream.

What is it they’re relieved about? What is it about him that they want to save? _What has he got left_?

“I want to keep you in overnight.” Dan is saying, helping him up. “Just in case, while we run the tests.”

Some small flicker of reality makes him raise his head. “I don’t have insurance.”

“I never took you off mine.” Annie crosses her arms. “I should have, but”—she shakes her head, smiles ruefully—“I’ve got good coverage, don’t worry.”

Eddie opens his mouth- and he has no idea what to say. “I don’t want to hear it.” Annie flicks the unspoken words away. “Now, the police are waiting to grill me downstairs. You look after him.” She kisses Dan and Eddie barely feels the sting of loss at the sight. It’s drowned under the numb, frozen shock.

“Okay.” Dan smiles, and leads him out of the MRI room. “It’ll be okay, Eddie. At least it’s not in you anymore.”

Eddie stares at him, and starts to laugh. He’s crying. He’s laughing. He falls to his knees and wants to scream but he doesn’t have the air. He half-notices Dan calling for help as the ringing in his ears drowns the world in white noise.

 

* * *

 

 

  _He’s burning. He’s drowning, half crushed beneath the waves and he’s still burning. Sinking down, colder and colder as the flames fade far above him and his senses slowly cut out, one by one and there’s nothing but pain pain pain burning and cold, freezing and agony_. _He screams and nothing comes out, not even bubbles he doesn’t have a mouth he’s burning he’s split across and scattered across the stars and it’s nothing but pain pain pain—_

The world comes back white. He blinks, blinks again. He’s in a hospital bed. “Venom?” He whispers, presses his knuckles into his chest. No. Nothing. The explosion. The fire. The MRI. He’s gone.

Eddie closes his eyes, buries his face into a pillow that reeks of lavender and disinfectant. He wants it to rise up and swallow him, drown him under foam and cotton and sink him out of sight and gone. Not to die, but just to- not be here. Not be anywhere.

And maybe that comes, to some extent. He closes his eyes and the exhaustion finally crashes over him and drags him under like a riptide.

The second time, he wakes slowly, his mouth and head feels like cotton. “Here.” A cool glass is pressed into his hand.

Eddie sips the water. His head _hurts_ like the world’s worst hangover, like he’s cried himself to sleep over and over. The water helps, and the pain sinks back to the great, gaping sense of _loss_ deep in his chest. He blinks, and Dan comes into focus, sitting beside him.

He’s smiling, but it’s thin and wavering, and there’s fear in his eyes. He’s pale and—God, but Eddie’s heart jumps, desperately digging for any thread of hope, the way he’d dug for any sign of Venom. If Dan was afraid, if he thought Venom wasn’t _gone_ —

“We went through your MRIs.” Dan says unsteadily, and _oh,_ the hope is so piercing it hurts.

“Did you find—” He can’t say it.

Dan doesn’t understand. “Your organs are fine. Better than fine,actually,  but—” He breaks off, looks away. Takes a deep breath. “I think there maybe have been a reason he was—eating—your organs.”

Venom left a part of himself behind, he took part of Eddie and it let him survive.  He’s not dead. He can’t be.

“Were you aware you know you have stage four cancer?” Dan breaks into his thoughts.

Eddie’s mind just- slams to a halt. _What?_ “What?” he croaks.

“I should have seen it.” Dan continues, “But we had other worries and the alien was skewing your results. It must have eaten the parts that had metastasized, but it—it must not have had time to finish the job. It’s got the hallmarks of pancreatic cancer, but…"

Eddie sits in silence as Dan rambles on, letting the words wash over him until he’s blind and senseless. Like tides over sea anemones. Prognosis, grades, treatment options. It’s something out of a medical drama. It’s something he’s seen happen in dozens of TV shows. It’s not happening to him. He’s the guy who saved the day and lost everything anyway. He’s from the shittiest kind of grimdark action movie, not a Hallmark tragedy. This isn’t happening. This can’t be happening.

“I talked to Annie.” Dan continues. “We’ll get you out of this, there’s still a chance. She’s on the phone to the insurance company right now.”

Eddie jerks back to himself, blood rushing hot with horror. “No!”

Dan stops. “Eddie, you need _treatment_. That alien might have stalled it, but we found tumors in your pancreas and liver, and that’s just the ones that showed up on the MRI. Your white blood cell count is too high, so it might be moving towards leukemia-“

Eddie holds up both hands. _Stop_. “Just- shut up.”

Dan shuts up. For a moment, there’s only his own ragged breathing, the world crashing in too fast, too hard. “She needs to get me off her insurance.”

“No! Eddie, if you don’t—”

“You said I’m—” he swallows. “It’s terminal.”

“There’s still a chance—”

“But it’s not fucking high, is it?” Dan doesn’t argue. “And it’s going to be—it’s going to ruin her. She’s going to wreck her credit score, her policy, it’s going to cost her hundreds of thousands, all for—”

“For you.” Dan says softly. “Eddie, we’re _not_ about to stand by and let you die.”

_Die_. There, one of them has said it. And, fuck, it’s almost a _relief_. The explosion. Venom burning and screaming and, yes, _dying_. The whole, devouring _emptiness_ of the world without him. He has no idea what he can possibly do now. Dan is telling him he doesn’t need to bother.

“Well, tough.” Eddie slides his legs out of the bed and stands up. He’s wearing hospital scrubs. “Where are my clothes?”

“Eddie?” Dan gets up, “Eddie, you need to get back into bed. We’re going to need to do more tests, a biopsy—”

“No.” Eddie turns to him. “You’re not. You’re going to cancel these fucking tests before Blue Shield gets their teeth any further into you and Annie, and you’re going to get my clothes, and I’m going home.”

“Jesus _Christ_ Eddie, you can’t be serious—”

“Where are my clothes?”

“I’m not letting you out like this!”

“No, you’re gonna get my clothes so I don’t flash the whole world.” In case he’s going to be difficult, Eddie grabs the blanket and wraps it around himself.

Dan stands up and yeah, he’s going to be difficult. “I threw your clothes out, they were wrecked. Annie was going to stop by and get you fresh ones, but your place is a bombsite right now.”

Right. LIFE Industries. Eddie would feel angry, but feeling anything is a bit beyond him right now, and besides, if Dan’s right, he’d have been dead in another few months anyway. “Okay, tell Annie I’m sorry, but I already fucked her life up once and I’m not gonna do it twice.”

“Eddie!” Dan shouts as Eddie heads to the door. “For _fuck’s_ sake—”

The door closes, Eddie walks to the elevator. Dan follows him helplessly, a few steps behind. “Please.”

Eddie doesn’t answer. Doesn’t turn around. There’s nothing Dan can do. There’s nothing illegal about walking out of a hospital.

Even if you’re dying.

 

* * *

 

 

Annie might be calling him. Eddie doesn’t know; he doesn’t know where his phone is and anyway the fall in the bay would have killed it. His keys are gone too, but the only thing barring entry into his apartment is the police warning tape over the still-open door. Eddie pulls the tape off and throws it away. He’s glad he opened the door to LIFE’s goons, it means he can close the door and lock it behind him, slide down the plasterboard, and collapse bonelessly on the floor. He stares bleakly at what used to be home.

It’s wrecked. He hadn’t had time to tidy after his ravenous rampage and the floor is scattered with reeking pieces of chicken and tater tots and the wreckage of LIFE Foundation's abortive attack. And it seemed like a nightmare at the time, but Eddie’s fingers dig into the floorboards in the desperate _need_ to pull back time and stay there. To huddle himself into Venom and pull the warm, savage symbiote around him and _don’t go, please don’t go_.

He closes his eyes, his head rolls back. He’d been so _scared_ , so angry when Dan told him what Venom was doing. God, even then, Venom was just trying to keep him alive, even when Eddie didn't even know he was dying. And Eddie—

They’d barely had any time together, so few snatched hours with a creature who knew Eddie inside and out, every last petty thought, every pathetic lie, every blind fuckup. Venom, who knew Eddie better than he knew himself— and still sacrificed himself rather than let Eddie die.

And Eddie had let him be torn away, squandered their hours away without realising just how _fucking precious_ they'd one day become. Like using diamonds for skipping stones, except Eddie would happily rob a hundred jewelry shops for just _one more hour_ with Venom.

He's crying again. It's a distant realisation, numb and pointless. The hot tears are a lone point of warmth in a world gone so cold and _dead_ he can't bear it and what's even the fucking point if he'll be dead in a few months anyway? There are razor blades in the bathroom cabinet, he doesn't have to—

The train of thought derails abruptly. Eddie stares at nothing, not seeing the ruined apartment. He's heaving for breath as though he'd run a marathon. He gets up stiffly, pads quietly across the floor as though the slightest noise would reawaken that thought, and finds his way to his bed.

It's still in one piece, although it reeks of teargas. Eddie lies down, looking up at the cracked and peeling ceiling. It's off-white, just enough to be annoying, but Eddie loses himself in it, lets it blank out the world, well up through him until everything's filled with not-quite magnolia.

In his heart, there's an open wound that had nothing to do with tumors, ripped open and pulsing pain with every beat. That brief moment, a heartbeat of connection as the fire swept up to consume them. Venom pressed close against him, a burst of bright emotion, fierce and brighter even than the flames. The warmth of connection. To travel across the universe and fall into the one person he'd dreamed and longed for before he'd had words to describe it. That no words in any other myriad of millions of languages across the cosmos could describe.

The disbelief of finding something he had never dared to hope he'd find.

**_Goodbye, Eddie._ **

 

* * *

 

_It’s cold now, and that’s better than the pain but not by much. Cold all the way through and he wants to curl up and find some warmth inside himself but there’s so little left, so much of him burnt away and blasted off until he’s nothing but raw loss, the endless probing touches to where he should be and isn’t. The water washes over him, the growing weight of tides slowly pulling at what’s left of him, dragging him away from the shore, towards the endless sea._

Eddie wakes with a heavy head and a stuffy nose, pain pounding through every nerve of his body. He gets up. Uses the bathroom, drinks from the tap. Goes back to bed. Sleeps and wakes up feeling worse. Sleeps again.

There's a banging on the door and he rolls over and pulls the pillow over his head. It goes on for a while, then it stops. A few tentative notes from a guitar filters through from next door and Eddie almost smiles, then it _hurts_ and he's squeezing his eyes closed, just wants to sleep and sleep and maybe if he's lucky he'll just not wake up again and everything will just be black and warm and nothing forever.

Hunger gets him out of bed eventually. For all that it's a grey and pitiful shadow of what he'd felt with Venom, it's enough to keep him from going back to sleep. He staggers out, throws on clothes he doesn’t bother to look at, and stares hopelessly at the mess of his kitchen before turning to the fridge.

He finds ancient take-away even he doesn't want to risk eating. 'The cupboards yield a few packets of microwaveable ramen, and the freezer opens to reveal a half-empty bag of tater tots. He stares at it for a moment, picks one out, and eats it.

It's like a kick to the gut, the sudden double awareness of barely twenty four hours ago. At once his own memories of their blinding hunger, the sensory-shock pain of the frozen tots crunching between his teeth. And Venom, and his hunger. Hunger so familiar it's like an old friend. The alien novelty of this new food, sweet and tangy and so cold, the way his new teeth scythe through them and the tingle they leave behind-

The microwave dings. Eddie looks around. He doesn't remember falling to the floor. His eyes are burning, salt filling his mouth. Tater tots are scattered around him. As though not quite of his own volition, his head turns towards the bathroom. The cabinet. The razor blades.

He can't stay here. He needs to get out now, before he gives up and goes back to bed and this replays all over again except next time he might not be able to stop.

Eddie takes the ramen out with him, eats it while walking, he manages less than half before he feels sick, his throat growing tight. He throws the rest of the noodles and the bowl in the trash. He's got more at home, and it's not like he's thinking long term.

One way or another.

He walks across the bridge. He can see people picking through the wreckage across the bay, but it's been long enough that they look less like officials and more like San Francisco's usual crew of homeless and lost looking for something worth a few bucks. Or the curious and foolhardy searching for something Instagrammable.

None of them pay any attention as Eddie joins them. He sinks to his knees by the shoreline, where the last few tides have washed up fragments of twisted metal and half-melted plastic. It hurts less here, a weak and exhausted tug deep inside him, filling the emptiness. More than nothing. Some part of him wants to lie down and sleep all over again, let the water wash over him and—

_No._

Eddie gets up and starts walking up the tideline, eyes cast down. If there's something, if there's anything at all, he'll find it. He _has_ to find it. Something to hang on to, when the world is crumbling down around him.

It's more exercise than he's had for months, barring the last few days. And maybe if he had gone out for more than the time it took to go to Ms. Chen's, he might have realised something was wrong. Breathing seems to come too fast, like there's not enough air, and his joints are picking up a whole host of new pains he'd never considered before, or maybe just dismissed as them getting old and out of shape.

There. Just as it's getting late and his company on the shore is flaking away. Just—there. Tucked behind a strand of tussocky grass where the waves must have thrown it just after impact.

Eddie doesn't run. He's sweating through his clothes and when he sits down, his legs are trembling so hard he's pretty sure he couldn't have, even if he'd wanted to. But there's no point. It's not going anywhere, not any more.

It's so small he can hold it in his palm. A scrap of black edged with grey, slowly carbonising with exposure to air. It slips through his fingers as he tries to pick it up, loose and gelatinous and dead.

"Come on." Eddie whispers, but there's nothing and—he's kidding himself. It's just one long, cruel fucking _joke,_ what he's doing to himself, trying to kick the embers of hope into something like a fire. The tiny piece rolls down and lands in the sand, skin turning dusty. Eddie picks it up anyway. It's so fucking small but it's there, the tiny, weak proof that this was _real_. That Venom was real. He existed, he loved Eddie and he died for him and right now Eddie will never, ever forgive him for that.

He should bury the remains. He's not sure where—not anywhere near LIFE, that's for sure—but it's like the wound in Eddie's chest gives an extra tug, and he's walking down to the water, into the surf and opening his hand to let the water wash over the small piece of Venom, catch it and pull it away into the depths.

And the numbness flies away and that hook is suddenly a spear and it _hurts_ and it _wants_ and it's so much and so _big_ and Eddie is drowning in it and he's struggling through the water trying to reach- something, the knife inside his heart, the hand around his throat. _Please where are you_ — 

Hands close on him and jolt Eddie back to reality. "Whoa! Whoa, man! Stop!"

He pulls, tries to get free, but the hands are too strong and he's soaked through and shivering and for a moment everything is burning again and _he_ 's burning and Venom is wrapped around him, alive and warm and—

**_Goodbye, Eddie_.**

Eddie screams, and throws up. Someone swears then there's a warm hand rubbing his back as he's sick again and again in the surf. "It's okay, man." The voice is warm too, gentle. "I got you. S'not worth it. I know it seems bad, but you can get through it."

Eddie looks up, the craggy dark face, the shocking white teeth, the rasta hat. He knows the guy.  He hangs out on the corner of Mason and Clay; he'd helped out with that tip off about the covert harassment campaign the police were pushing two years ago. _God._ "James, right?"

His eyes go wide. "Holy fuck, Brock? What the—? You look like shit, man."

Eddie tries to smile, but it just slides off. "Yeah."

"Seriously though man. I mean it." He squeezes Eddie's shoulder. "It's never that bad. We've all been there, it's never worth it."

"I wasn't—" Eddie breaks off, because was that even true? A pull, dragging him under the water. The welcome cold of the water that somehow seemed warm. Close his eyes and drift away and stop hurting. "I just—" He can't even convince himself.

James nods, rubs his back. "I heard what happened. You got anywhere to stay?"

"Yeah." Eddie closes his eyes and all he can see are the razorblades. “No.” He _can't_. He wouldn't be able to resist. "I don't know."

James nods sympathetically. "It's okay." He keeps rubbing his back and it's so _human_ it hurts, so much kindness and not enough. Eddie feels tears prick his eyes and he blinks and blinks again. "You know, there's a place under one-oh-one that I'm camping at. There's a few people you might know, and we can spare you a sleeping bag."

Eddie hugs himself, shivering. His clothes are soaked through and he's starting to get really cold. "I—" he looks back desperately at the bay. "I need to find someone."

"Well hey, most of them are probably going to be at the camp, so we can ask around—" he stops, looking at Eddie. The exhausted lines of his face, the eyes burning red with salt, the tears he can't seem to stop. "Shit." He stops. "He wasn't in the rocket?"

Eddie turns away, he _can't_ oh God it hurts and the pain, the hook is trapped between his ribs, pulling and tearing and it hurts so much—

And James hugs him. For a moment Eddie can't move because it's what he desperately wants but it still feels completely wrong and he starts laughing, cracked and broken.

"Hey, hey. Shit, man, I'm so sorry."

"He saved my life." Eddie manages, and his voice fractures completely and he wants to scream and he can't and there isn't enough air and it's all _too much_ and he can't he can't _he can't breathe_ -

At some point, the awful screaming in his head starts to fade, and he's back on the beach with James, rather than in whatever awful space he'd been in just then. "I've got to find him," he chokes through the tears and snot.

"For what it's worth, I heard some of the cops talking, and they never found any bodies." It's weak, but Eddie tries for a smile. James' lined face is drawn up in sadness and God, he understands. Maybe he doesn't know anything about Venom or what he meant to Eddie and that's fine, because Eddie doesn't either, but at least there's someone else who he can mourn with. "Come on, you're gonna freeze like that."

Eddie shakes his head. "I can't, I—" what? He can't stay here, with the waves pulling so hungrily at the beach. He can't go back to his flat, so full of waiting razorblades. But looking at James' weary, kind face, Eddie knows he can't go with him either. He's got so little, Eddie's can't take any of it. "I'll be fine."

"Yeah, somehow I don't believe that." He pulls Eddie to his feet. "I'll see you back, if you pay for the taxi."

Eddie shrugs, "You go home. I- I can stay a bit longer."

"Yeah, no." James grabs his arm firmly and starts marching him back to the road. "You got any money?"

Eddie shakes his head.

"What about that girl of yours— Annie, right?"

"We broke up."

"Shit." It's half under his breath. "You got anyone, anywhere to go?"

Eddie looks back at the bay, the sun's gone, and there isn't a breath of wind. The sea sighs softly against the sand, barely wrinkled. "I've got to find him."

"Then you can look for him tomorrow." James gets them to the road. "I'll even help you, okay? First thing tomorrow, we go look for your friend."

Eddie sucks in a deep breath and fuck, what can he say? That he's looking for an alien who tried to use him to end the world and ate his organs but not really because they were full of cancer and then he changed his mind and tried to save the world and Eddie abandoned him and he still came back and saved Eddie again and again until he had to die for him and Eddie gave him fucking nothing and can't even stay long enough to try and find him?

 

* * *

 

The homeless camp under one-oh-one isn't far. It's even bigger than he remembered it two years ago. James leaves him sitting on a piece of cardboard, an inquisitive dog sniffing at him, while he goes to find something to eat. Eddie stares dully into the haze of hats and duffle coats and dumpster fires and doesn't see any of it. He should be feeling something, he should be angry, should be scouting around for a story, building something with his words he can use to _change_ this, make a difference, give back to these people.

But there's nothing. And even if he had his laptop and his phone and his apartment he couldn't write anything because there's _nothing_ inside him. It's all hollowed and burnt out like Venom took every part of Eddie worth having with him when he died.

James comes back with a sandwich and a cup of soup. The smell of it makes his stomach turn over even as it aches from hunger. He turns away. "Sorry. ‘M not hungry."

"Hey." James looks at him steadily. "You gotta eat, man."

"Not really." James pushes the sandwich into his hand. Eddie looks down at it and, when James doesn't stop _looking_ at him, tries a bite. It tastes like ash. "I'm gonna be sick."

"Latrines are over there." He nods towards a storm drain.

Eddie nods. He finishes his sandwich, and lies down when it struggles to come up again. James tosses a sleeping bag and he huddles under it, shivering. "It's better if you get in it."

"I’m not cold." He is, but the sleeping bag isn't going to help. "You know I'm dying?"

James doesn't answer at once. "Shit."

Eddie tries to smile, it doesn't feel right, but it's the best he's managed in day. "I just—don't want anyone to waste anything on me? It’s not worth it."

"Yeah, no. You can shut that up right now." James sits beside him, pets his dog until it curls up in his lap. "You're in a whole fucking camp of the ‘not-worth-it’s. You don't get to tell us who we care about."

There's nothing Eddie can say to that. He closes his eyes.

Everything's become so hard. Sleep is the only thing that comes easy.

 

* * *

 

The hook is back inside him, pulling him through the mud and asphalt and down to the bay. He tries to cry out and it comes out in a stream of bubbles as he's dragged underwater and he tries to scream, but all that comes is more bubbles and the searing burn of saltwater in his lungs.

Then even the faint glimmer of streetlights and moon above cuts out, and everything is black.

_He's floating the currents, pulled this way and that, sinking deeper. Across the sand patterned by the endless tides, the jagged shards of fallen metal, the garbage dragged in from the city. He clings to all of them, tries to hold himself together, gather more parts of himself. But the water is pulling at him, currents gentle but insistent._

_He tries to dig for purchase in the sand and it just flakes away under him in useless flurries that float into the darkness. He clings to the splinters of metal, some still hot inside from the blast, but they are moving, too, slowly slipping away into the sand, into the sea. Inexorably away._

_The pressure of the water is heavier, pushing him down and away and he wants to stay, he so desperately wants to stay._

**_Eddie…_ **

Eddie jolts awake, his hands digging into the cardboard and asphalt so hard his fingertips are bleeding. He kicks off the sleeping bag and staggers upright. There’s a faint drizzle in the air, the distant neon of the overpass haloed in orange.

He needs to go. He needs to go _now_.

The dog growls and wakes up, pulling free from James’ arms and padding over to Eddie. Eddie tries to wave it away, but James is already awake.

“What?” James shakes his head. “Man, what are you doing?”

“I gotta go.” Eddie sighs. “Thanks, but I—I’ve got to—I can’t—”

He turns; he’s so tired his body doesn’t want to work at first, and the run he tries to force it into ends up at more of a staggering stumble, lurching through the camp, kicking against sodden cardboard boxes and stacks of newspapers.

James swears. “Jesus man, it’s four in the fucking morning.” But he starts after Eddie, the dog yapping excitedly.

The camp isn’t really asleep, but the noise they’re making is getting attention. Eddie steps on someone and gets a curse and a kick. James finally catches up with him. “Come on, what are you doing? Let everyone get a bit of rest, we can go in a few hours—”

“I can’t.” Eddie pleads, “I’m sorry. I can’t. You stay but I’ve got to find him he’s _there_ I can feel him—”

James hesitates and Eddie takes a step back. He’s lost a lot of weight and his coordination’s shot to shit, he can’t get into a fight. “Please.” He repeats. “I can’t stay.”

“Oh, fuck this.” James groans, and takes Eddie’s arm. Eddie tenses to pull away, but James helps him out of the camp, “You’re friend better be in a fucking submarine or some shit.”

“Something like that,” Eddie wants to cry from sheer relief. “He can’t get out. I’ve got to get to him.”

“Okay, just hang on a minute.” He leaves Eddie at the edge of the camp. “Literally a minute, just stay here for God’s sake, I’ll be back right now.”

Eddie grits his teeth, shifts from one foot to the other and hugs himself in the growing haze of the rain. The dog whines at Eddie and Eddie shrugs, patting its head absently.

James comes back quickly, just as he said. He’s got a couple of blankets, a piece of old rope and a handful of dog leashes he’s tying together. “Okay,” he sighs, “let’s go find your friend.”

 

* * *

 

 

The  beach is deserted now. There are few signs of what happened here. The wreckage has been scavenged or towed away for scrap, the broken branches gone and grass already growing back. Eddie walks down to the edge of the water and stops. His eyes hurt in the dim half-light, his ears ringing with the struggle to catch something. But there’s nothing to see, nothing to hear. Even if there was, the water would have swallowed it.

“Okay.” James is looking resigned. Probably he thinks Eddie’s gone crazy, but wants to make sure he doesn’t hurt himself. “Get your things off, and put this on.” He tosses the end of the rope to Eddie. Eddie strips down to his underpants and ties the rope around his arm, tight, but not so much he can’t slip it off if he needs to. It won’t be long enough, but James doesn’t need to know that. “I’m going to stay here, you find anything, give two tugs and I’ll come in to help, okay?”

“Yeah.” Eddie looks around one more time, hope to see—something, some sign to show him where to go. The bay stretches wide and empty around him, silently mocking. So empty, so huge, so deep. How can he possibly find anything, let alone something so small, all alone?

Then he staggers forward, a hand in his gut grabbing tight and _pulling_ hard enough to throw him off his feet and he knows, oh, he knows.

James’ shout is lost and he dives in, the water is so cold it burns, but the sensation is too distant for it to matter. The currents pull at him and he doesn’t fight them, he knows them. Eddie pulls his head up and drags in a deep breath, slips the rope free and dives down under the water.

Eddie swims and swims until his muscles burn and his fingers and toes are going numb, but suddenly it’s _there—_ that slow, deep insistent _drag_. Not riptide strong, but deadly all the same. The sort of tide you wouldn’t even notice before you looked up and realized it had drawn you so far from shore you couldn’t possibly come back.

A desperate, panicked tug inside him. He’s running out of time. Eddie surfaces, coughs and hopes desperately the taste of salt is from the sea. He drags in a breath that feels far too shallow for what he’s trying it do, and goes under.

The water is shallow here, it’s shallow across nearly all of the bay, but there’s something cold in the current, hungry and dreading and Eddie surfaces and dives again, and again, he touches sand suddenly and claws it—but it just slides away, washed down—

Towards the bridge. And the great, yawning rift beneath it, hundreds of feet deep.

“Shit!” Eddie chokes in one more breath, and goes down. It’s so dark he can’t see anything, but the hook in his gut pulls, drags, forcing him deep and deeper until Eddie’s lungs are about to burst. He breaks the surface of the water again, inhales air and water and something too slick and heavy to be water, and doesn’t care. “Come on,” he rasps.

He dives again, there’s the faint flash of light above, a helicopter passing by. The lights sweep over and Eddie catches a brief flash of sea floor, and something bigger, darker, on the edge of his salt-blurred vision before his traitorous lungs force him back up for air.

“Come on!” Eddie swims, wild and flailing with exhausted muscles. He bobs for a moment, treading water and struggling to catch his breath. God, he’s _tired_. More tired than he’s ever felt in his life. It’s so dark now Eddie can’t see the beach anymore; can only blurrily make out the fuzzy lights of the bridge, far too close. He closes his eyes, tries to breathe deeply and steadily, getting ready to go down once and for all.

One way or another.

“I’m here.” He pants. “I’m right here, you fucking asshole. Come on—” One last deep breath, and he dives.

It’s deeper here, nothing but nothing all the way down. Eddie starts as his questing hands bang hard against something rough and sharp, a shard of metal. Eddie grits his teeth, feels the sick heat of his own blood waft against his hand. Can he smell blood? Can he feel that Eddie is _right here,_ _come on!_

Nothing. Eddie tries to go down further, but his lungs are screaming, stale air bursting out in great bubbles. He kicks up, barely breaks the surface of the water before he’s panting for air. Oh God, he can’t. He’s come so far, he’s dragged himself bruised and bleeding back here over and over and he’s _so close_ and he’s going to die here, trembling and numb with cold, too tired and sick to fight any more.

“Please,” he whispers; he doesn’t have breath for anything more. “Please.” There’s a tug deep inside him, lost and forlorn. The currents are pulling at them both now, and Eddie feels a jolt that isn’t his—the piece of wreckage has shifted just a little more, threatening to tilt over the lip of an undersea cliff and down and gone forever—

“Shit!” Eddie screams, high and wailing and lost. “Come on, you fucking _parasite—”_ and he grabs the hook with his mind, winds his thin awareness around them both, and _pulls back_.

There’s a rush of emotion. Shock and fear and desperate, hopeless joy—“ _Fuck!”_ Eddie screams, and dives down.

He’s swimming blind, the wreckage he found has moved and there’s a deep, hungry pull down, some gaping abyss beneath him swirling with cold currents that drags everything into it like a sucking mouth. Eddie finds the wreckage by banging into it at the last moment, feels it tilt and there’s a burst of _panic_ and Eddie grabbing at the shattered metal, the sand, the waving strands of seaweed and—

That isn’t seaweed.

They wrap around his hands, sweep up his wrists and arms and oh he’s so _warm_ , Eddie wants to cry, wants to laugh, wants to scream—air bursts free of his lungs in a desperate approximation of all three. The tides pull at them, Eddie tries to kick, tries to pull away.

But everything is suddenly so _heavy_. He’s trying to swim with lead weights, his whole body dull and dead as a stone around him. There’s no light, above or below, he can’t see, he can’t hear. There’s nothing. _Nothing_.

Eddie wants to laugh; only just manages a smile. This is it then. Better than dying in the hospital and ruining Dan and Annie. Better than the razorblades, than wasting away in James’ camp. He’s warm, long tendrils wrapping hungrily around him and _oh, I’m so sorry. I tried. I swear I tried I shouldn’t have left I’m sorry—_

Something slick and heavy washes over his mouth, and suddenly there’s _air_. Eddie chokes and gasps, breathes wet and sodden air. The tendrils coat the inside of his mouth, down his throat, feeding him air and air and _air_ until he’s lightheaded and dizzy with it. Laughing and crying hot, salty tears.

**_Eddie_. **

It’s barely a whisper, broken and exhausted and so weak. So different from the hungry growl that coated his spine and shivered against his jaw. Eddie grins helplessly, no longer caring about the cold that even Venom is struggling to hold off, the drag of the current, the growing pressure of the water holding them down.

“Venom.“ Eddie manages, thick and heavy against the tendrils in his throat. “I’m so sorry.”

**_Not sorry. Help us. Please, Eddie_.**

Help us. It sounds ridiculous, he’s exhausted and broken and dying, but _he has Venom,_ he can’t give up. Not now, not ever. Venom feeds him the strength he can but he’s in worse shape than Eddie is. He’s gathered as many shattered parts of himself as he can, but so much was burnt away he can’t even cover Eddie properly.

**_Please_.**

Eddie kicks and kicks, clawing at the water. Venom coils over his fingers and webs them, tries to push down to do the same to his feet, then recoils, shuddering in exhaustion. He’s hitting his limit. Eddie’s long past his. They are at best treading water, but the tide drags at them. It is tireless, unrelenting, and they— they can’t keep going.

“Sorry.” Eddie whispers again. “I can’t. I—”

**_No._** Venom curls inside him, warming his core, trying to strengthen his bones. Getting ready to be pulled down into the dark and the crushing pressure of the water. **_Shouldn’t have reached for you. Should have let you go_.**

“No.” Eddie closes his eyes, gathers his strength for one last desperate struggle for the surface. “Thank you. Better like this.” He tries to push the memories through to Venom; the hospital, the cancer, the apartment, the razorblades. “Wasn’t going to last long.”

**_Could have helped you_.** The last burst of strength gets them a little further up, but they go right back down, and this time, they aren’t going to come up again. **_You have friends, they could_ —**

“It—” Eddie’s body goes limp, too exhausted to do more than spasm. “Wasn’t worth it.” He whispers against Venom’s skin. “Not without you.”

**_No._** Venom agrees sadly. **_Love you_.**

Eddie closes his eyes. It’s so dark that it makes no difference. “Love you too, darling.”

Something thrums high above, them, then there’s a punch through the water as something huge hits the water. Eddie jerks his head up, and there’s _light_. He tries to move, but can’t do more than to reach up towards the blinding, white glow so far above. _What—_

And hands close around them. An arm wraps around their waist and they’re being hauled up, so hard and sudden through the water that even with Venom he can’t breathe-

Eddie’s head breaks the water. There are flashlights everywhere, the roar of a patrol boat, people shouting. He coughs, Venom sliding down his throat and huddling inside him, trying to keep him warm. “Got him!” Someone roars, and Eddie blinks at the man holding him, now pulling him over to the boat.

It doesn’t feel real. It feels like snapshots of moments with nothing connecting them. Dragged aboard the boat. The crinkle of a foil blanket. The sweet heat of hand warmers. Hands holding a thermos, offering a cup of coffee. Eddie takes it numbly, drinks. It can’t be too hot, but he’s so cold that it feels scalding.

“Venom?” he croaks.

**_Yes_.**

_Good._ Eddie closes his eyes. If this is a dream, he hopes he won’t ever wake up.

They help him out of the boat and towards an ambulance. James is hovering with an early morning commuter he must have flagged down to use their phone. “You’re a fucking asshole, Brock!” He yells. “What the hell was that?”

“Found him!” Eddie manages, grinning helplessly. “I found him. It’s okay James, it’s all good—”

James throws up his hands in surrender. “You’d better put him the fucking psych ward, I swear!“

Eddie doesn’t fight as they maneuver him down on the gurney. “Okay.” He’s so fucking _tired_. They both are.

“You got a preference on where to go?” The paramedic looks at him wearily.

“Yeah.” Eddie presses a hand to his stomach, where Venom is huddled in. “Saint Francis; and I need to make a phone call.”

 

* * *

 

 

He doesn’t need to make the phone call. Dan is waiting for him at the hospital, arms crossed, and trying to look disapproving rather than relieved and failing utterly. “You are an absolute _asshole_.”

“Yeah, got that already.” Eddie smiles. It’s good to see him again. It’s good to see _everything_ again. The world has been so dark. So empty. It feels like seeing color for the first time in weeks.

“You are going to be involuntarily committed until you come to your senses.” Dan doesn’t let him get up off the gurney, pushing him back down. “We sorted out the insurance; you’re going to sign for your treatment, or you’re going in a psych ward.”

Eddie closes his eyes. “You can help?” He whispers.

**_Of course._ **

“ _Yes_ we’re helping.” Dan rolls his eyes and pushes him into the hospital. “Not that you deserve it, after everything you’ve put Annie through.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You can say you’re sorry by signing these.” Dan throws a stack of papers at him. “Chemo and radiotherapy to start with, but we might need to look at surgery. You don’t get to give up so easily, and if you stop being a moron and get into treatment, we can give you a damn good chance.”

**_Don’t need poison. We can do it, hunt them down and regrow what we need._ **

“Thanks babe.” Eddie smiles, kneading his knuckles over his abdomen.

“What?” Dan stares at him, then his eyes go wide. “Oh, shit.”

Eddie sits up. Dan tries to push him back down again, but Venom’s giving him strength, so Eddie grabs his hand and pins it to the gurney. “No.” He says flatly. “I’ll behave, I’ll be good. You don’t fucking _touch_ him. No MRIs, no noise, no fire.”

“He was _eating you_ —” Dan hisses, pulling his hand free.

“Eating the tumors, remember? So you don’t need to bother with surgery. I’ll sign these, okay? I’ll sign whatever you want and I’ll try and pay Annie back when—” he breaks off because- when? His apartment is a write-off, he has no job, his bank account is barren. He has no idea where to start.

The enormity of everything threatens to swallow him, the undertow dragging him down. It’s too big, too much to hold in his head—

**_No,_** Venom snarls.

“No,” Dan sighs, handing him a pen. “Stop. Get back on your feet and then we’ll talk. Now sign the fucking papers and you can explain to Annie why you’re back to playing host to an alien.”

Eddie smiles wearily. Yeah, she’s going to be mad. He flicks through the papers authorizing treatment, biopsies, chemotherapy; he signs them all. He’s looking forward to seeing her, mad or not. He hadn’t really believed he’d ever see her again.

**_Shh, Eddie_ , **Venom purrs. **_We’ll look after you_.**

“We’ll look after you.” Dan takes the papers back and nods. “Just—” he shakes his head and pats Eddie’s shoulder. “You’re not alone, okay? Remember that.”

“I know.” Eddie slumps back onto the gurney and closes his eyes as they’re rattled into the hospital. “I won’t forget again.”


End file.
